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Topic Review (Newest First)

Yesterday 11:00 PM

DKShrimporium

Well, apparently, DK's going steady with Murphy

DK's got problems every which way, right now.

Beginning with the need to cut a chunk of drywall out of her kitchen ceiling the other day, to DRAIN THE WATER. Ugh.

After extensive diagnostics, it appears there is a leak on the drain line to the master shower. But of course the water has its own mind, and decides to drain across the ceiling to ANOTHER location. So the giant hole in her kitchen ceiling is just the water sink (i.e., the low spot where the water has come to rest, and seek a drainage path), NOT the location under the actual leak. So that means at least one more huge hole, under the actual leak. She had to cut out the water sink location because the drywall has soaked and sagged, and the insulation was sopping wet, needing to be drained, at that location. She also wasn't sure if the plumbing bits at that location were the problem, as it happens there is a buncha plumbing right above the sink location. Turns out they aren't.

Drywall patches are bad enough, but it so happens she had a high end, smooth drywall job, and the kitchen ceiling is flooded with light from transom windows, right across the ceiling surface. This means that ceiling is absolutely unforgiving for anything other than a perfect fix.

But, DK makes lemonade out of lemons. She's thinking maybe it's the perfect excuse to get those vintage-tin-look ceiling tiles...

+++++

Her new injector arrived. But it is defective. Grrrrrrrrrrr. She ran diagnostics and re-configured it every which way, but it simply won't perform to specs. This morning, she finally called the manufacturer and explained the dilemma. To their credit, they believed her, and are sending a new one. But, they FIRST have to custom build it, so there will be a rather long delay. They don't actually keep these items in stock, they custom build then test them when an order comes in. Sigh.

+++++

DK is having issues with one of her tanks. Metrics are off, and she thinks there is something wee-ard with the filter. Something like the filter is beating the water too much, outgassing it. Today she did some filter adjustments, to see if the wee-ard-ness stops. Because some of the wee-ard-ness includes unexplained croakings, and this has to stop, in this tank.

Most of the tanks are churning along, though. She really can't complain. Cross yer fingers, though, because, due to the injector issue, her Sulawesi bank of tanks is now offline from the Water Factory for an extended time, AGAIN. She was just barely climbing out the the hole with them from Shrimpmageddon.

+++++

Tomorrow, the last of the parts for the Water Factory expansion are tracking to arrive. She was all pumped to get it installed and start beta testing, except now she has to wait A LONG TIME for another injector to get here, so that is a big bust, until then.

++++++

Finally, the motorcycle ramp has arrived. Should be just perfect, except at the moment last night's half inch coating of ice melted and the yard is liquid mud.

++++++

DK has to go ponder her house plumbing leak, now. And decide where to cut the second hole in her kitchen ceiling.

Note to all y'alls: iff'n ya ever build yerself a house, take pictures every which way before drywall, so you know what's behind the walls. DK did, and boy have those pictures come in handy, and saved her skin, many times.

DK is very stubborn, and will prevail. But she might be very grumpy, for a while.

She did clean the glass on the monochrome Black Tiger tank recently, but doesn't have time to take pics until she fire-stomps all these other issues. That tank is really doing well.

.

02-28-2015 04:11 AM

wicca27

i have never understood why they call them blue bee's when 95% of the time they are shades of brown!.
and who they are loverly DK some healthy looking shrimpies you got there and nice eggs as well

02-28-2015 03:44 AM

DKShrimporium

Blue Bees

.

02-25-2015 10:46 PM

wicca27

beautiful as always

02-25-2015 07:38 PM

DKShrimporium

Behind the scenes jostling

DK's a-werkin' on several fronts at once, lately.

Shopping:

Motorcycle ramp - check

Parts: Water Factory final expansion - check

Parts: Kitchen fridge enclosure - in progress

Parts: polychrome fixture - in progress

Shrimporium upgrades:

Water Factory expansion - in progress

Shrimporium audio - check. She just ran wire to be able to play spotify from her computer down to speakers in the Shrimporium. Nice.

Lighting - check - all new full spectrum lamps, commercial grade

Housekeeping - uhhhhhh... whut? DK needs a Shrimptern to kick her around until she cleans up her spaces and get 'em organized. Please contact her if you think you could do this magical thing. Because, it would be magical if she ever got it cleaned up and organized. Totally magical.

Workbench pegboard - comin' up soon

So, shopping scheduled for tomorrow.

***********

IN OTHER NEWS:

DK has confirmed Mr. Lothario has knocked up six Sister Wives, so far - five redheads and one brunette. One of the redheads was a teen pregnancy and dropped her eggs. But everyone else is holding, and decent loads, too. Several other Sister Wives are sporting large saddles and are biding their time until the next blow-out party.

Talk about partying hard. The Blue Bees have more than half their wimmen in the family way. When that tank pops, it pops. It's probably more like 80% but DK is too lah-zhee to count wriggling bodies and see for sure.

DK has confirmed a new batch of young in the Cardinal tank. Pretty soon, she's a-gonna clean their glass again and take a look. Their glass has grown slimy, and prohibited good viewing, since the new lights went in. She did not want to terrorize her berried females in there until they dropped their young, cleaning glass.

Papaya crystals are drivin' DK nuts. They really got wiped out last summer. She has one, maybe two females left. One has been carrying eggs she SWEARS for about six weeks, so what the heck is the deal? They are just taunting her.

Wiley Boy crystal has molted TWICE since his separation from Bumble's tank. That dude measured in at 1.5 inches this morning, and he's eating well in his bachelor pad. Bumble is about to get evicted as his tank will be the focus of the Water Factory expansion and beta testing.

Everyone else is cooking along briskly.

++++++

Today's eye candy: more Cauldron pics (hey, it's the only tank with clean glass at the moment)

Another shot of charcoal hot momma.

And a random shot showing what DK LOVES about the cauldron: body tints from mint to jadeite to emerald to forest to turquoise to cobalt to navy to tan to brown to smoke to charcoal. Stripes in black, chocolate, purple, dusky red, fiery red. And the body tints wax and wane according to excitement or hormones. So it's like a living kaleidoscope of tiger shrimp, in there.

Be sure to click the kaleidoscope picture to see it full size!

.

02-24-2015 05:38 PM

DKShrimporium

Which brings up the philosophical question...

Quote:

Originally Posted by larcat

Confirming that I am brain dead. Confirming, also, that I studied philosophy (which is something people do, I swear.) Pretty sure the above is correlation, not causation...

Glad you are well!

Today's philosophy - ponder this:

...If one is confirmed brain dead, is one capable of confirming this?

++++++++++

IN OTHER NEWS:

Hard, hard partying in the sister wives tank with Mr. Lothario, last night. This morning, evidence that at least three had disrobed during the festivities. Since there were so many hangovers, it was hard to entice them out of the weeds, but DK did find Mr. Lothario's first knocked-up brunette hanging around. Up until now, he had been after the redheads.

+++++++++

More views from the cauldron.

Our purple/red juvie. Just GORGEOUS, now at about half inch size. Shows plum colored with subtle red stripes, to the nekkid eye.

And another gorgeous shrimp. This female is charcoal grey with florid red stripes. Really beautiful.

DK is in love with the cauldron.

++++++++

Finally, yesterday she mounted the shelf unit above her fridge successfully. Now, she ponders how she wants to do the front plate, trim, and side door. (The corbels are placed to view the spacing proportions, and she has a temporary corner support installed until her sliding door is made.)

++++++++

OK she lied. (DK lies a lot. However, she DOES NOT JUICE HER PICTURES in any way. Just to be clear.) THIS is finally. Today, her new piece of equipment is tracking to arrive!!! Whoo hoo!!

.

02-24-2015 03:40 PM

larcat

Quote:

Originally Posted by DKShrimporium

So, for any of you in the cave who aren't brain dead (presumably - hopefully - a high percentage), this thread is more about philosophy than shrimp, actually.

Confirming that I am brain dead. Confirming, also, that I studied philosophy (which is something people do, I swear.) Pretty sure the above is correlation, not causation...

Glad you are well!

02-23-2015 05:08 PM

DKShrimporium

DK has a major MAJOR eureka moment

So, for any of you in the cave who aren't brain dead (presumably - hopefully - a high percentage), this thread is more about philosophy than shrimp, actually.

Today, we hit on that, first.

For a solid year, plus, now, DK has been stymied on a project in her Kitchen, trying to figure out how she wanted to do something. (Note the symantics, here: not how to do something, but ratherhow DK wants to do it.) She's going to build a surround for her fridge that is a bit oversized, and needs a cantilevered platform about 2 foot by 4 foot as the roof structure of this surround.

But, of course, she doesn't do anything the standard way. There are ALWAYS factors that complicate her projects, exponentially.

In the case of the fridge surround, she wants a sliding wall to the side, so she can slide that sucker forward and vacuum out all the German hair whenever the mood hits her. Philosophy: she believes in access, in her designs.

How does this relate to shrimp? Well... she's a-gonna use a leftover slide from her ASA (uh, that would be: Adjustable Solar Axis) project, to make that side panel slide forward. Ahem.

But ON TOP of that, she wants the least amount of goo on her hardwood floor, both for the future homeowners and for the sake of giving German hair no place to drift against/into. Philosophy: she believes in the sleekest/simplest/most efficient design that will accomplish the set of criteria.

This is important functionally, because her counter-depth fridge has all the heat dissipating happening at the bottom, where German hair is MOST likely to collect and clog, and cause - ahem - the insulating effect, trapping her fridge heat against the fridge. See her lovely thermal image. So handy, those cameras.

So, she wants a smooth floor (i.e., no track, no cleat, etc.), a hanging, sliding side panel, and a HUGE wooden canopy above, somehow not falling off the wall and also holding up the hanging, sliding side panel.

Yeah, yeah, there are a number of ways to do this. But, as always, DK needs to be sporting, which, in this case, means cheap. She doesn't want a million denaro solution to her physics. She wants to use cheap, readily available stuff, preferably stuff she already has, to do things, whenever possible. Uh. Back up, there. There was philosophy just there.

Those of you who have been in the cave a while may remember the Habitat Re-Store desk she bought and pulled apart. She used the desk top (writing surface, that is) to make a plate for a new kitchen trash pull-out. (Those of you who are especially enterprising and go to the links, and especially observant and note details, will also note that DK used another leftover slider from the ASA project for the trash pull-out.)

She's had the top shelf piece sitting, left over, from the desk, for the past year. Clogging up her office, taking up real estate.

This morning, she was looking at it, like EVERY morning, and - wait... here comes the philosophy... her recent-years habit of sitting with a problem and letting it fully ripen before acting... she had her a major eureka moment. The desktop shelf unit is mortised and tenon-ed, hardwood doweled together - built for gymnastics.

IT IS ALSO THE PERFECT SIZE FOR HER CANTILEVERED FRIDGE ROOF.

Due to the mortise/tenon/doweled construction, she had not pulled the parts apart to make something else from it, yet.

Due to the mortise/tenon/doweled construction, THIS MORNING, she realized it's the perfect construction for her cantilevered roof. That sucker is NOT going to warp or rack under stress.

OK. OK. Lotsa words. All this to say:

If you ponder a problem long enough,
the solution will usually arise.
If you let it RIPEN,
the BEST solution will come.

- end philosophy, for today -

+++++++++

Quote:

Originally Posted by wicca27

DK you have me drooling over tigers again. so not fair.... all the colors are cool to. i love the forest green and red stripe

Quote:

Originally Posted by Maechael

Ditto. Also all the shrimp in the shrimporium, the room, water works and all make me a bit jealous.

OK, so DK has used up her word quotient for the day, above. And also her philosophy quotient. She has a whole essay on tiger shrimp, and philosophy, but --- not today.

Instead, she does her own version of throw-back Monday: a picture of her humble beginnings. DK did not start out where she is at. She started with plastic dollar store bins, cheapo parts, and lots of research and elbow grease. She then learned through mistakes how to grow shrimp, then used the shrimp she grew to pay for her upgrades. Work. It was all work that got her here. And a LOT of failures, lessons in tenacity and also what shrimp want.

++++++++++

IN OTHER NEWS:

She has a lovely young male, in his prime, who is between Jadeite and Emerald, with BRIGHT red stripes. Handsome, he is. He is also EXTREMELY active, never still, so she stinks at getting pictures of him. And I mean stinks.

After shooting about 200 pictures of hyper boy, she still only managed TWO that are remotely illustrative of this specimen. She's pondering naming him Nicholas.

Here are the less-than-ideal pics she was able to produce.

.

02-23-2015 05:36 AM

Maechael

Yeah what She said.

Quote:

Originally Posted by wicca27

DK you have me drooling over tigers again. so not fair.... all the colors are cool to. i love the forest green and red stripe

Ditto. Also all the shrimp in the shrimporium, the room, water works and all make me a bit jealous.

02-23-2015 03:42 AM

wicca27

DK you have me drooling over tigers again. so not fair.... all the colors are cool to. i love the forest green and red stripe

02-22-2015 12:41 AM

Maechael

Here's an older one, still looking for a green haired picture.

02-21-2015 08:18 PM

DKShrimporium

Hey, it's a Siberian front; DK has nothing to do but shrimp watch!

So, DK cleaned the glass, and took more pics.

Another view of the lovely Ms. Jadeite Chocolate.

AND...

DK found a FOREST green with red stripes! The picture doesn't show it very well, but from normal viewing this one looks forest green.

Velly coo-el.

.

02-21-2015 03:02 PM

DKShrimporium

More bubbles up from the Cauldron

Quote:

Originally Posted by wicca27

im soooo happy to see you DK ! i have not been getting email updates that people have been posting to this thread again. guess its time to start checking in every day now that your back at it. shoot me an email when you get a chance i know your busy

Hi, C!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Maechael

DK direct answer, employment.

Long answer my hair was 18-24 inches also it was malachite green mixed with methylene blue in tribute to a friend. Normally it was long and brown, or brownish blonde, and ponytailed for work.

I guess a little insanity on my part was in there, as the beard went with it too.

We need a picture of the previous rocker 'do. It sounds cauldron-like.

+++++++++

IN OTHER NEWS:

DK has been assembling parts and pieces for the new Water Factory expansion. She has figured a few things out that were bugging her about the design, too.

Somehow, she needs to find about two square feet of real estate on her mounting board.

Hmmmmmmmmm.

++++++++

And, she's a bit hesitant to post this, but decided to go ahead. She thinks she has made a red-striped purple tiger. She needs to wait to see how this shrimp finishes out, but the red will stay red, and the background may be purple or smoke when finished. But this youth does not LOOK like the others that finished red-striped-smoked.

From a DISTANCE, these purple tigers look... purple. They do not look smoke, or blue, or brown, or beige. Stand across the room and look at your monitor to get a better effect.

She has some freaky coo-el stuff bubbling in the cauldron. It's taken two years for the initial gene sets to break apart and start mixing well. About 4-5 generations, she figgers.

ALL the pictures below taken under the new full-spectrum lamps. NO color alterations or photoediting other than cropping has been done to them.

.

02-21-2015 06:46 AM

Maechael

DK direct answer, employment.

Long answer my hair was 18-24 inches also it was malachite green mixed with methylene blue in tribute to a friend. Normally it was long and brown, or brownish blonde, and ponytailed for work.

I guess a little insanity on my part was in there, as the beard went with it too.

im soooo happy to see you DK ! i have not been getting email updates that people have been posting to this thread again. guess its time to start checking in every day now that your back at it. shoot me an email when you get a chance i know your busy

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